Former Foxes Favourite Forgets Favours

2 May 2014

Rovers manager Paul Dickov has maintained that he wants his side to secure their Championship safety on their own terms.

Dickov, who scored 40 goals over two spells with Leicester in more than 100 appearances, knows that the runaway winners of the league won’t be helping out their old boy but a win against his former employers will seal the immediate future of his current employers.

“They’re a fantastic team, they’ve got a fantastic manager as well and somebody that I’ve got a lot of respect for. I more or less finished my career playing under Nigel [Pearson] and the work and intelligence that some of his staff have was fantastic for me going in to management.

“Looking at how Nigel and his staff work, I’m delighted for them that they went up as Champions and they deserved it,” he said.

Despite their huge total of 99 points, the Foxes have slipped up from time to time, including a 1-0 defeat courtesy of Kasper Schmeichel’s own goal at the Keepmoat Stadium earlier in the campaign.

“We’ve got to go down there and we have to do a job, we have to be solid because going forward they’re a good attacking team but I want us to, like in every game, go and express ourselves and there’s no better game to do it than when you’re playing the Champions with a big crowd and fantastic atmosphere and I believe I’ve got the players that will relish that,” said Dickov.

Around 32,000 fans are expected to witness the Champions officially crowned with the presentation of the Championship League title trophy, but the fanfare is something that doesn’t faze the Rovers gaffer.

“I won’t be giving two hoots about anything else that is going on, to be honest,” he said.

“I want our players to play with freedom, its difficult sometimes, but what we’ve got to do on Saturday is make sure that we put on a performance.”